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Do people actually fall for this?

tb-player

tb-player

Why so serious?
Mar 6, 2019
6,705
29,948
East Coast, USA
#1
I have a beautiful fretless for sale (possibly) here and on Reverb.

Today I received a DM on the Reverb listing from 'Lauren Smith' asking me to email her mom, who is interested in my bass. (Yeah, this sounds legit... lol)

I have an anonymous email I can use if I'm not sure who I'm talking to. So, just for fun I emailed the 'mom' asking her to please reply with any questions.

A few minutes later, I received an email reply from the 'mom' stating that her son was actually buying the bass. He wanted to buy the bass with a cashier's check and have a long-haul courier pickup the instrument once the funds had cleared my bank. All I had to do is reply with my name, address, phone number and the price of the bass.

Of course, I ignored the email and marked it as spam. And the original Reverb message is being reported to Reverb support as a scam.

My question is, does anyone actually fall for such an obvious attempt? I guess someone must have if people are still trying this nonsense. :rollno:
 
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#3
In short - yes.

I've met them. And I don't know how, but they're not always the people you would think the dumbest. Possibly just too trusting and inexperienced? I don't know. But yeah, it happens.

Pretty much all the people I know who have gotten taken by such scams suck it up because they know they were fools. They let it go quickly, lol.

That being said - when I was 18 yrs old I had just gotten paid $60 cash for my part time job. It was 1979, 2 days before xmas, and I stumbled upon a 3 card monte guy on a corner. I just watched. I knew I had this guy beat and threw down a 20 so I could have more xmas shopping money. I knew I couldn't lose. When he turned the card and I lost I was dumfounded. Felt like I got punched in the face. It took the guy about 90 seconds to get my other 40. Nothing like that has EVER happened to me again.

Ah hem... that kinda makes me one of those people, huh :) ? OK. I'm outta here now.
 
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#4
Joe Nerve said:
In short - yes.

I've met them. And I don't know how, but they're not always the people you would think the dumbest. Possibly just too trusting and inexperienced? I don't know. But yeah, it happens.

Pretty much all the people I know who have gotten taken by such scams suck it up because they know they were fools. They let it go quickly, lol.

That being said - when I was 18 yrs old I had just gotten paid $60 cash for my part time job. It was 1979, 2 days before xmas, and I stumbled upon a 3 card monte guy on a corner. I just watched. I knew I had this guy beat and threw down a 20 so I could have more xmas shopping money. I knew I couldn't lose. When he turned the card and I lost I was dumfounded. Felt like I got punched in the face. It took the guy about 90 seconds to get my other 40. Nothing like that has EVER happened to me again.

Ah hem... that kinda makes me one of those people, huh :) ? OK. I'm outta here now.
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Yeah, those 3 card monty guys are ridiculous. I don't think you're one of 'those guys' for falling for that as an 18-year-old. This Reverb scam is on-par with that email I got from the Nigerian prince (still haven't seen that 10 million dollars... :laugh:)
 
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#10
I've actually gotten the same ruse from stuff I'd advertised on Craigslist. It's not a new scam but for someone uninitiated to such scams it might seem reasonable. I only take cash face to face or if I were to ship something it would be via PayPal paid in advance. Can't be too careful these days, way too many out there with no morals and no scruples. (In my best old guy voice) Damn world's gone completely to hell... :sour:
 
#12
I'm buying it right now. There was a error with payapl and too much money was deducted from my account leaving a huge negative balance in my checking account. When you ship me the Bass with tracking number, deposit the overpayment of $5247.18 back into my paypal ASAP. I can't pay my rent. My wife just left to move back with her mother and left our disabled baby for me to take care of. I need this money today so the dog won't eat anymore dirty diapers because I cant pay for clean ones right now.

Yeah, things like this happen all the time. Criminals are not very sophisticated in their ways and just keep doing whatever worked last time and the times before that. You should see all the marijuana by mail online scams out there right now.
 
#13
Yeah I have seen these come my way, more-so on CL though. I would actually be curious what would happen when it came down to the nitty gritty of personal information. And no offense to some of the "older" folks but often they dont have the selling experience as stated above..
 
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#17
Shepsdad said:
There are lots of good people in our world, in every country, every walk of life….but I prefer dogs, dogs never try to scam you.
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I beg to differ…
My dogs will come barking at me to feed them. After I feed them they’ll go to my wife or the kids & try to scam them out of another can of dog food… ‍♂️ I’d say their success rate is probably higher than the (fill in the blank) Prince!!!
 
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#18
tb-player said:
All I had to do is reply with my name, address, phone number and the price of the bass.
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You could reply with that address of the local police station.
 

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#19
Just a question tho, I get it sounds fishy AF, but how would they be able to scam you by getting your adress, name and number? That's all part of the info I exchange with people whenever I buy/sell anyway.
 
#20
H K said:
Just a question tho, I get it sounds fishy AF, but how would they be able to scam you by getting your adress, name and number? That's all part of the info I exchange with people whenever I buy/sell anyway.
Click to expand...

Read the OP again. That info is just the setup for the fake cashier check, my guys gonna pick it up scam.
 

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